Then he thought of the cooking. His mouth remembered its first taste of the incomparable kidney omelette. What an ecstasy! Still, a ten-pound note for even a kidney omelette jarred on the fineness of his sense of values.
A feminine laugh—Helen's—came down the narrow stairs and through the kitchen.... No, the whole house was altered, with well-bred, distinguished women's laughter floating about the stairs like that.
He called upon his lifelong friend and comforter—the concertina. That senseless thing of rose-wood, ivory, ebony, mother-of-pearl, and leather was to him what a brother, a pipe, a bull terrier, a trusted confidant, might have been to another James. And now, in the accents of the Hallelujah Chorus, it yielded to his squeezings the secret and sublime solace which men term poetry.
Then there was a second, and equally imperious, knock at the door.
He loosed his fingers from his friend, and opened the door.
Mr. Emanuel Prockter stood on the doorstep. Mr. Emanuel Prockter wore a beautiful blue suit, with a white waistcoat and pale gold tie; yellow gloves, boots with pointed toes, a glossy bowler hat, a cane, and an eyeglass. He was an impeccable young man, and the avowed delight of his tailor, whose bills were paid by Mrs. Prockter.
"Is Miss Rathbone at home?" asked Emanuel, after a cough.
"Helen?"
"Ye-es."
"Ay," said James, grimly. "Her's quite at home."